Friday, May 25, 2012

New Beginnings

We have had a lot of support and inspiration from friends as we've been working towards a major goal - the opening of a halfway house for our homeless friends who want to change their lives.
This goal has been coming to life faster than I can keep up with! As our three small households have become ready, Eric moved in with his wife Kenya and their baby daughter Lauren. They will serve as our case managers, and have been getting settled in and preparing to serve incoming residents.

Two weeks ago we took in our first resident, Samuel. Sam has been a friend of ours for a long time. We've seen him through rehab twice... but without a supportive home to come back to he ended up back on the streets and in his addiction both times. We have hoped that a long term supportive housing for Samuel might help him to stabilize in his recovery. I don't assume to speak for tomorrow, but I have been encouraged by his progress so far. Samuel is working for a friend in our church, and has been excited at his own new lifestyle. In this picture he's helping me do some baking for our church café.

Samuel has also been very supportive of our second resident, Daniel. Daniel is going through dialysis treatment and so he has had a rough start as he is learning to live with new physical and working limitations. Today we were surprised to learn that in talking between themselves, they had decided that tomorrow Samuel would accompany Daniel to his dialysis treatment, so that he could talk to the doctor and get better information to help Daniel eat right at the house. That was a pretty cool surprise- the helped becoming the helper is a tremendous step in the walk of recovery!

I give thanks to God for the great things that have taken place! And thank you for you prayers, financial support and encouragement of this process. It continues to be a great adventure!